University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop graduate Nickolas Butler will read from his new novel, Shotgun Lovesongs, at 7 p.m. Monday, March 24, in a free reading at Prairie Lights Books in downtown Iowa City. The reading also will be streamed live on the UI Writing University website.

Shotgun Lovesongs is a contemporary story of a group of friends from a small Wisconsin farming town. One of them never left, still working the family farm that has been tilled for generations. But others felt the need to move on, with varying degrees of success. One trades commodities, another took to the rodeo circuit, and one of them even hit it big as a rock star. And then there’s Beth, a woman who has meant something special in each of their lives. The story begins when the one who became a world famous rock star returns home for a wedding.

“Shotgun Lovesongs is a Midwestern masterpiece that has done for the modest splendor of verdant farmlands what Larry McMurtry did for the brutal beauty of small town Texas,” says Amber Dermont, author of The Starboard Sea.

Butler’s writings have appeared in Narrative Magazine, Ploughshares, The Kenyon Review Online, The Progressive, The Christian Science Monitor, and elsewhere. He lives in Wisconsin.

The Iowa Writers’ Workshop is a graduate program in the University of Iowa College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

Individuals with disabilities are encouraged to attend all UI-sponsored events. If you are a person with a disability who requires a reasonable accommodation in order to attend this reading, call Jan Weissmiller at Prairie Lights in advance at 319-337-2681.

For a UI arts calendar and details about upcoming events visit the Arts Iowa website.